


Delusions

by Ashen_Demon



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Amazing how Byleth never punches Dimitri during that specific section of the game, Blue Lions Route spoilers, I should fix that sometime, but not now
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-05
Updated: 2019-08-05
Packaged: 2020-08-09 22:45:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20125081
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ashen_Demon/pseuds/Ashen_Demon
Summary: Dimitri is a mental case and Byleth has decided that voicing their thoughts won't help right now... And several other times when Dimitri voices his delusions.





	Delusions

“_It’s also important to remember that no matter how sad you are, eventually your tears will dry up._”

Then what about yours? Are you suggesting your tears will remain even till death? Is that where those wild flames of hatred in your eyes come from? Will they leave?

“_That’s when you have to figure out what it is you’re living for._”

Then why do you not do the same? Are you even alive anymore? You’re not you and you’ve even called yourself a walking corpse… Ready to throw away your life and the lives of those you once cared about in a vain attempt at revenge. You can’t get revenge so recklessly against a force like this.

“_Look deep in your heart and I’m certain you’ll find the answer there… Indelible and inescapable._”

Have you looked inside your own heart since that day? Since you found who you believe caused such a tragedy for you and your people? Are you afraid to look? Are you scared you’ll find yourself without purpose?... That couldn’t be further from the truth. You are the king to your people and this war must end for their sake... You once wished to build a world where people were not taken unjustly from their friends, their family. I still remember that wish in the Goddess Tower. Is that not enough of a purpose for you, to bring that wish to life?

“_There is no one else I can… My strength is yours alone._”

As is my strength to you. My strength is yours, I just wish you weren’t so careless with it as you are now. You’re reckless. All I can really hope to do is steer you into a bit less dangerous territory. So we can live long enough for you to get that revenge you so desperately seek. To hopefully see a time where “you” are you again. A point where I will again trust the fact that I’ve lent my strength to you, that I’ve given nearly all I am to you and your wishes. However, I still must guard the others. They are here for me, for the person who you once were, for their families seeking salvation. They did not sign up to die by your maddened mind. So I cannot allow you to kill them for such insanity.

“_No matter what enemy we face, we will not fail. I promise you that._”

I make that promise to you as well, but you must allow me to “delay” your revenge for it. I do it only so we may actually beat them. With expansive the enemy’s forces are and how you’ve been so carelessly trying to maul them… I don’t even think Sothis’ power could save you… I don’t think my divine pulse would be enough to spare you. It’s failed before, as I have no need to remind you…

“_He’s exaggerating. He thinks my color is off and that rest will cure all._”

I still remember after that battle, after Solon was defeated. The way you started to deteriorate. Everyone could see it. You were training yourself to the bone. You got sloppy in your desperation to push yourself to learn more, for the revenge you sought. You pushed people away, even those who cared for your health. You wouldn’t rest despite knowing you were ill. I should have stepped in then to try to catch you…

“_I will kill Edelgard. With my own hands. I swear it!_”

Then again, even if I stepped in then, it wouldn’t have saved you, would it? No… In fact, you might have been more reluctant to let me have as much control over this situation as I do. You yield only because I have seldom been wrong and others insist upon my decisions. I wonder, if I had tried to interrupt before, would you end me to have me out of your way? To stop with all the delays?... That “joke” in the Goddess Tower wants me to think not, but yet… I still remember that laughter from the day Garreg Mach was invaded for the first time. You had already fallen so far…. Had I heard it without seeing you, no one could have convinced me the noise came from your mouth. I wish I wouldn’t have hidden how it made shivers run down my spine. Perhaps that would have gotten through to you somewhat.

“_I should’ve known… That one day, you would be haunting me as well._”

Not unless you needed me… While I’ll admit, you need me now more than ever in hopes to bring you back from the brink… I’d only haunt you to try to reason with you. The dead seem more real to you than any of us do now. I wish I could blind you from them. Maybe then you could return to us.

“_Hmph. If that is the case… That can only mean you are another imperial spy._”

You once chastised Edelgard for looking for deceit behind everything, did you not? Yet now… I don’t think anything I could do would convince you I was me if you didn’t want to believe it… Why do you want to believe it? Is part of you still in there somewhere? I desperately want to believe so.

“_I have been dead, more or less._”

More so than less… There’s no light in your eyes. Only hate. If I couldn’t see you bleed, couldn’t rest my hand on your shoulder to try to convince you to hold off or calm down, I wouldn’t believe you aren’t a ghost. I still hardly believe you aren’t some sort of undead, but your blood says otherwise… I may be the one lacking a heartbeat, but I can no longer tell if you have a heart to begin with. You had once said that your heart cannot trust someone who kills without feeling, did you not? Am I supposed to trust you now that you’ve become that? Do you trust yourself?

“_I must kill them. Every last one_.”

You had once told me killing never got easier for you. You’ve… “Grown” past that I see. Do you enjoy this? Do you remember they’re people? Do you remember what used to disturb you about fighting? You’ve become exactly who you want to kill. Torturously killing beloved friends, precious loved ones. I wish I would have done better for you. I wish I could have somehow kept this cruel fate from you. But even turning back the hands of time to the day we first met wouldn’t have saved you.

“_Someone must put a stop to this cycle of the strong trampling the weak. Or do you condone their actions?_”

Then what do you call what you’re doing? You’re trampling the weak in a mad attempt at revenge. Many of the people in this world are just trying to survive, trying to help those they care for survive. Yet here you are killing them without a second thought. I hate that I’m helping you and I dearly hope that I’m not mistaken thinking you’re in there somewhere. As for condoning their actions? If it is truly as you said it, pillaging, killing and burning for fun, you know I could never condone such actions, especially after what happened to Remire.... But I can’t say I condone your actions either. Why do you think I try to be a voice of reason for you? We didn’t have to kill them and you know it. We could have stopped them. It’s what you used to look for. A way out of dirtying your hands. A way out of being those who scarred you like this.

“_All that matters is killing those who deserve to die._”

And who are you to be the judge of that? A maddened prince who won’t even save his own people. What right is it of yours to decide who is worthy to live and who must die? It has become scary how much you remind me of the Imperial Emperor. I could imagine those wards falling from her lips as well. None of us truly have the right to decide who lives or dies. Our versions of justice are all different and our information of why someone would commit a crime is woefully incomplete. It always will be. Even with the soul of Sothis being one with my own, even I have to right to claim any creature shouldn’t live. I will have to take lives with my hands as I’ve always done to survive… As I’ve always done in hopes of ending the suffering of a greater amount of people than I’ve condemned, of easing the troubles of those precious to me, but I will never have a right to say those I’ve killed deserved to die. Neither will you. Your judgement will always be based on incomplete evidence and biased decisions, you have no right to decide who deserves death.

“_Shall we go rat hunting? Don’t let a single vermin escape!_”

I’m repulsed that I followed through with that order even after the others had shown up. I should have done what I did with those who were from Duscur. I should have told them to pretend to be dead, I should have spared them from your insane wrath… But had you found out, I would never be able to lead you away from much worse slaughters, from our own slaughtering. So… I suppose I must once again say they were necessary sacrifices. Those words will always be sour on my tongue but they are reality. Especially under your rule as it is now and the Emperor’s tyranny.

“_We must wipe them all out until not a single one of them remains…_”

And yet the Tragedy of Duscur was unforgivable. What you plan is genocide of anyone that doesn’t immediately give you their weapon, of those you can’t scare or force into into trying to kill anyone you deem worthy of death. That sounds familiar, does it not? I may as well serve the Emperor. I might save more lives that way if this haze of hate doesn’t stop clouding your mind soon. Even I cannot speak reason to you without your blade ready to “put me in my place”.

“_My enemies say the same._”

They do not. You know they don’t. Are you that far gone where you cannot remember that we’re not your enemies unless we remain silent and kill as mindlessly as you do? I can’t even speak to you about battle plans, about how best to dismantle the empire you hate so passionately. You don’t care, you just want blood on your hands. You want to see yourself as a corpse, as a monster. You don’t want to see any humanity in you and confront your actions. You don’t want to want to admit that the dead are more real to you than the living as of late. You don’t want to admit you’re like your enemies, uncaring whether foes or allies die in search of your goal. You don’t want to admit your humanity died with that lackluster reason to live you have.

“_Only hatred remains. If I could tear that woman to shreds right this very moment, I would._”

So my delusional prince, who is it you speak to. Glenn is not here. He’ll never be here. You speak to the air. Both the Goddess and myself are witnesses to that. They do not haunt you. It is guilt that haunts you, not them. And if it is them… You would stab me should I inform you that the living obviously care more for you than they do. Do you know how I fear to call you the name you once used? It would be like admitting this is all that’s left to you. A prince lost in hatred, speaking to the ghosts of those who never came back to haunt you and throwing away the living to appease the dead. Do you care about the bodies you’re piling up? Would you listen to reason if one of us died and came back to tell you what you’re doing? I would gladly stab myself if you’d listen. But I doubt you would. Your delusions would just have you think I was scolding you to get a move on with killing the Emperor as well.

“_I won’t kill you right away, my fellow monster. Unless you object to watching your friends die. One… by… one._”

I killed him to save him from you. I wanted to puke listening to you. You once said you couldn’t trust me as I was said to kill without emotion. That you were unnerved by my lack of emotions, by the lack of humanity in my eyes and actions. What do you call this? You know you have no emotion. The dead merely edge you on to kill the Emperor. Not to torture those trying to survive under her rule. What if it was your own family that was threatened by the Empire? You would do anything to keep them safe. You do not get to decide who deserves to be tortured to madness with that vile mind of yours. I hate not trusting my strength to you and I hate not having the strength to properly stand up to you or put you out of your misery myself. I’m still held back by memories, by hope. How did you even think of such a threat? Obviously if he’s a monster like yourself, that punishment would mean nothing.

“_If you do not approve of what I have become, then kill me._”

I would if you were anyone else. But no. You’re the prince that once looked up to me, that once saw some light in the world. The prince that stood beside me and tried to help me whenever I had problems as you trusted I would do the same. I will not betray the trust of the prince I once knew. I may object to some of what you do and clash with you from time to time… But I will stand with you until you reach your goal or return to us… Or, perhaps, until I need to trade my own life for yours. I pray it doesn’t come to that… However, if it should, I will. You will not be struck down for as disturbed as I am by the creature you’ve become.

“_If you insist that you cannot… then I will continue to use you and your friends until the flesh falls from your bones._”

I truly am the only one that could hear you say such a thing and still stand defiantly at your side. Anyone else would abandon you. That or cut you down. Yet you didn’t even bother to raise your lance. Not even your arm. I remember that fight in the Holy Tomb. You could crush my skull and be done with me. Yet, you know as well as I do that I will not leave and I’ll allow you to use my strength as you see fit. I may protect others from your wrath, but you know so, so well that I’ll stay here until you get me killed. However, I suggest you be careful where you speak so freely, my delusional prince. Many are here for me alone. They will abandon if they hear such words from your lips, or they’ll get in the way should they feel you’re a threat to me. I know well that you won’t strike me yourself no matter how defiant I am to you, but others may not believe that even if I should tell them. I am too valuable a pawn to you. You know it well, you learned most of what you know from me after all. You know my skills on the battlefield are unmatched and that something watches over me. You still remember the day I escaped the inescapable, the day I tore the sky open, claiming to have received power from the Goddess. You know it to be true.

“_There is only one option. How kind of them to save us the trouble of killing them later._”

How kind of us to risk our necks trying to kill them in such heat without reinforcement for your pleasure. Had I stayed behind for one reason or another, you would all be dead, I have little doubts about that. How do you plan on getting your revenge, appeasing the dead if you join their ranks? You know you have no reason to live anymore, but why take us down with you? Would that not be more souls that would “haunt” you?

“_Are you asking me…asking the dead…to forgive that woman?_”

You know no one asked that of you. We merely asked you to save those that are still alive. We asked you if the living were not important. You told us they weren’t. Why are we less real to you than the dead? Even the man you said was a second father to you matters no more. How do you plan to kill the Emperor without help my delusional prince? Soon enough I’ll be the only one standing beside you and there may be a time where even I fall from your insanity.

“_If you stand in my way, I will strike you down._”

You know that isn’t true. I’m a powerful pawn, we already covered this. To strike me down would be foolish as I would be the last person in this world to leave you. My strength is yours so long as you don’t get me killed and I’ve been fairly lenient on how close you’ve gotten me to that without opposing you. So you wouldn’t dare to strike down your best chance at killing the Emperor. As you said to me long ago, I will kill anyone you ask of me. You wouldn’t ruin that even if you no longer care for me as a person, as a friend…

“_It matters not. I will kill them all, whether they are one or one hundred._”

You used to realize enemy soldiers were people too. These people were not involved in the tragedy you’re harping on, they did not steal everything from you. They’re merely trying to survive. For a man who grew so venomous over the idea of putting words in the mouths of the dead, perhaps you shouldn’t place sins on the soon to be dead without proof. But that clashes with your “reality”, does it not my delusional prince?

“_Five years ago… Did you not deem the woman who killed Jeralt unforgivable? I’m most certain you did. You couldn’t let her get away with her crime, so you took up your sword in pursuit._”

You’re right. I did. And I regretted it terribly seeing her fate. You would not hear anything beyond that you were right though. You wouldn’t hear the pain I saw her in, how I was helpless to stop the torture. You wouldn’t hear how her final words were begging me to help her, the look of terror and the desperate hand reaching out to me that still haunt my dreams for daring to be as selfishly driven as that. Perhaps we’ll discuss how that affected me when you are more reasonable. As for your next comment… It couldn’t be further from the truth as you are now. We are not the same. You feel nothing but hate and my heart weeps to see what you’ve become, what you’re doing, to see the suffering you’re putting everyone through. I know regret and sympathy, I know mercy. We will never be the same until you step out of the clouds that fog even the core of your very self, my delusional prince.

“_Idiots. Embracing death for the sake of that woman._”

Then what do you call me my prince? What do you call Dedue? We’re both far too willing to throw our lives away for your goal. Then again, I suppose I am the only idiot here, am I not? You want to protect Dedue. I am just a pawn. Then again, do you only care for Dedue since you thought him-... No, because you thought the same of me. So I’m the fool here. For the one you all used to look up to as your teacher, you would think I’d be smart enough to learn to leave you. Shame I’m not. It will surely be my undoing. Though… I saw a glimpse of the old you. Just a hint- Just for a moment. Perhaps I am not taking such a risk in vain afterall.

“_I can finally kill her… Finally… I can avenge them…_”

Then what will be left of you? When you finish this… There will be nothing for you. You will finally be a corpse… And I’ll be honest, if Dedue wasn’t watching, I’m not sure if anything would have kept me from recoiling away from you in that moment… That voice wasn’t your own… It was that same beastly voice I heard just before Garreg Mach was assaulted… I hate it still. I trust nothing about this version of you if I may speak freely my delusional prince. I pray that this version of you leaves soon. I still trust the actual you. I miss him dearly. I never meant to leave you for so long…

“_Anyone who stands in my way will be crushed beneath my feet…_”

You know better than this. If that were true, we would all be dead. We’ve been delaying you. We’ve been in your way, and yet you have not… Also, you know Claude would have helped us. You know the messenger was intercepted by an Imperial supporter. You just don’t want to acknowledge it. You want to be a beast, you want to spill as much blood as you can. Meaningless sacrifices to appease the dead that never really haunted you. To appease a guilty mind of being the only survivor. I don’t claim to understand such guilt, but I know that it’s allowed you to give yourself solely to hatred, so I’ll continue to try to bring you away from it. I promised I would… Though, as I think about it, this has gone beyond the “duties” of a professor. Keeping promise after promise to stay with you, to act as a tool for you, my delusional prince. To try to save you. Perhaps there was always more to this than I was willing to acknowledge… Well, it’s too late to return my promises and throw out these feelings. So I’ll continue playing the fool.

“_But you seem to have all the answers… So tell me, Professor. Please, tell me…_”

And so I did. I told you how to start clearing away the fog, clearing away the voices of guilt masking themselves as your fallen loved ones. I told you to forgive yourself as you spilt your heart out, reminiscing that it was revenge that has been driving you since you saw those you love die in front of you. You blamed yourself for not being strong enough to protect them, didn’t you? For not being able to kill those that took them from you that day. I told you to find a reason to live, to live for what you believe in, just as you told me that day five years ago, just as Rodrigue said to you. I promised him that I would guide you and keep this hatred at bay… I just wish that my promise didn’t have to cause you so much pain, that you didn’t have to witness that. But even if I had turned back the hands of time… I’m not sure I could stop what came to pass, and if I did, would it really help you in the end? You’d lose him again later in your drive for vengeance. It was hard enough rewinding time to keep you all alive that battle at Gronder with the way you had us in the middle of both armies so you could get to the Emperor… I don’t even know if I had a pulse left to spare… I wish I didn’t have to leave you as the survivor yet again. You already question your right to live for anything beyond the dead after the first time you were left alive…

“_Your hands are so warm… Have they always been?_”

But I see some of the old you shining through, some of “you” returning to your grief stricken voice. Even if it’s only for now, of course I’ll offer my hand to comfort you again. I’ll do as I need to to comfort you for now. You had done it for me, had you not? I still seek to try to ease your pains as I did back then… You didn’t go off to where you usually sleep that night. I hardly slept at all. I was too busy humming- singing songs as lullabies. I never really sing unless I’m alone and need to lament, but you needed comfort. You finally broke after these five, horrible, lonely years. So I’ll sing for you and stay awake to chase away nightmares as you’ll allow me for a night. Perhaps you’ll change again in the morning, but that’s fine, I have my promises to keep and I’ve never been able to turn you away nor anyone else in the Academy when you’ve looked upset. Though, you slept a bit late. So, I only leave you a note as I’m called to yet another strategy meeting… I’ll have to take a nap next I can, I can feel the daze of tiredness fogging me. However, I’m more than happy to deal with it if I could protect you for a night.

“_I wish to apologize. To all of you. I have led all of you down this dark path with me, and have caused so much suffering along the way…_”

… Perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps we’ve finally gotten through to you… As much as I agree with Dedue that you should be resting and healing after almost being assassinated… It’s selfish of me to say I’m glad you’re up. I’m glad to hear you talking like this again. It’s been so long…

“_I wish to do the right thing from now on. That is why I have made a decision… I intend to take back the Kingdom capital. I wish to save our people, those I turned my back on for far too long._”

I would be lying if your words didn’t give me a giddy sense of hope for all the wrong reasons. I do wish to save the people, I desperately want to end the suffering of as many as I can… But I would be lying if I said my sense of hope wasn’t for believing you finally returned to us. No longer a delusional prince…

“_I will no longer allow the voices of the dead to bind me. This is something that I must do… No. Something that I am choosing to do._”

… I’ve missed you dearly. Welcome back Dimitri, my king.


End file.
